


storge

by goatlysacrifices



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Fantasy, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), Hurt/Comfort, Hybrids, Interactive Fiction, Magic, Mystery, Parent Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), Piglin Hybrid Technoblade (Video Blogging RPF), Reader-Interactive, Sad Ending, Self-Sacrifice, Sick Character, Sickfic, Wilbur Soot and Technoblade and TommyInnit are Siblings, Winged Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), Winged Wilbur Soot, tommy is also there
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-18
Updated: 2021-03-19
Packaged: 2021-03-26 20:14:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30111417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goatlysacrifices/pseuds/goatlysacrifices
Summary: Phil was getting worse and worse by day and his sons didn’t knowwhatelse to do to fix itThey had tried everything, but the only thing left they coulddowas take him homeThe woods he came from were strange,youcould never tell the time of day in themYou just have toremember.
Relationships: Wilbur Soot & Technoblade & TommyInnit & Phil Watson
Comments: 10
Kudos: 21





	storge

**Author's Note:**

> remember chekhov's gun ;)

The trees looked on quietly as the group entered the forest, a small family with far too little luggage with them overshadowed by towering birches. The spots of the trunks acted as eyes as they advanced, the pinkette at the front leading a nervous looking horse down the winding path. 

The horse carried two figures—an older boy with mousey brown hair and what appeared to be a slumped over sack. Upon closer inspection the more human-like features shined through, long blonde hair poking out from beneath the blanket and a pair of wings hung limply against the stallion’s side. The former was holding up the blonde, a weary look on his face as his hands tightened with every uneven root they traversed.

Trailing a couple meters behind them was the youngest, hunched over from the heavy bag on his spindly shoulders. His feet hurt from walking all day long and there was something about the forest that seemed a little off, that made him question if entering it was truly a good idea. He didn’t bother to voice his complaints; his brothers had enough to worry about as is.

They were tense as they moved further and further away from the edge of the woods, pausing only to consult a fork in the path. So tense in fact, that all of them startled when the leaves around them rustled, caws sounding out as six crows took to the air high above them. The birds disappeared just as fast as they came, leaving the party skittish as they continued down the right-hand path.

The atmosphere only seemed to grow thicker with the canopy, the blue sky and drifting clouds fading out to a spider’s web of branches. They swayed in the wind as if reaching towards them, longing for something they cannot have.

Tommy shook his head to clear his thoughts, jogging to catch up with his brothers after he'd stopped to inspect the boughs.

“How do you even know where we’re going, Tech? Are you sure we’re not lost?”

Techno didn’t even look back at Tommy to respond, keeping his eyes trained to the fog that was starting to obscure the path before them. “I know what I'm doing Tommy. I've been here before, remember?” he sighed, pulling the reigns in his left hand a little tighter.

Tommy sped up again so he was level with Techno, raising an eyebrow at him when his brother looked up at his face.

“…Once,” he admitted, choosing to ignore Tommy's loud scoff in response.

After gaining no further distraction from the middle brother, he turned to the oldest—still perched on the back of Carl, face significantly paler than when Tommy last saw him. It was clear he was also restless from the way his hands shook where they steadied the limp body in front of him, from the way he kept glancing up at the forest roof every couple of minutes.

And Tommy got it; the trees were creeping him out too, just probably not in the same way.

Before moving to their current home—before Phil—both Wilbur and Tommy had spent time in the grim clutches of hybrid catchers. The months they had spent separate from Techno before he had found Phil to help them escape had been torture, and Wilbur had been certain he would never see the sky again. It was why Phil built a home to keep them safe far up in the clouds, instead of returning to his cosy cottage in the middle of the woods. He would do anything for his newly found sons.

They had proved they felt the same way in return after Phil got really ill only a year after the house was completed. They had tried their best, they really had: feeding him, making sure he ate and everything like that—he just deteriorated far too quickly for the limited medical knowledge they had between them.

They were left with no choice but to take him back to the forest he came from, where, if nothing else, he would be more comfortable when he did go.

Except the forest was nothing like the man had described—there were absolutely zero similarities to the stories he had told them before bed, of silver trees and gently flowing water. There were no chirping birds, no scampering creatures in the bushes; what little light did shine through the leaves was grey, nowhere near the soft yellows that they had been told of.

Phil shifted where he was cradled in Wilbur's arms, burrowing further into the brunet to try and combat the chill that had suddenly settled. It was as if they had stepped into the threshold of some unknown creature, breath swirling from their mouths even if it hadn’t a moment earlier.

The mist gathered around them, making Carl stomp his hooves in distress. Both Tommy and Techno turned to calm him, tearing their eyes away from the rapidly condensing fog they could barely see through anyway. Wilbur kept his sight trained on it however, eyes narrowed as the gloom wound between the trees fluidly.

The gentle reassurances were cut off by tried sputtering, a slew of profanities filling the cold air around them. Techno lifted his head to question the older only to have a hand grab him by the top of it and turn him back around to face the trees.

The fog had cleared slightly—but only in a specific place. Where there was a solid wall of tree trunks before, now stood a narrow path into the depths of the forest, trees blocking most, if not all, of the light from reaching it. Techno stepped forward cautiously, uncaring of the way his hair sat awkwardly after Wilbur's hand slipped off it, peering to try to see the end of the path.

“You think that’s the way?” Tommy called from somewhere behind him, picking up Carls reigns after he'd unceremoniously discarded them.

Techno shrugged, glancing over his shoulder to see the unsure looks on his family's faces. “I don’t know, probably?”

They decided to take the path, despite the general hesitance. It wasn’t as if they had many more options—Techno had only been here once (no matter how many times he insisted he'd know the house if they found it) and Phil was too out of it to elicit a response. 

The path was uneven, as if someone had hastily put it together; a weird design choice for the main path to your house, but none of them really had the energy to question it. Maybe Phil just liked his alone time, he did live in the middle of a massive forest.

When they eventually did stumble into a clearing, it looked a lot closer to the kind of forest they had been anticipating when they started their journey. The canopy was bare here, golden beams of sunlight uninterrupted as they bounced off the deep brown of the wood of the cabin in the centre.

Wilbur seemed to calm slightly at the sight of the sky, tipping his head back and taking a deep breath as they made their way over to the structure.

The cabin itself was fairly nice, even after at least a year of no upkeep. It was two stories tall, vines growing up the rich brown mix of bricks and wooden planks, a small garden lining the walls where flowers would be grown. The flowers were all dead though, long since wilted in the brutal cold.

The strangest thing about it was the huge stone bricks framing the front door, completely out of place from the rest of the house. They were engraved as well, ornate letters spanning the top edge of the red door.

**Airson an earrach, feumar ìobairt**

Tommy snorted at that, turning to look at Techno with an amused look on his face when the other started at him unimpressed.

Tommy supplied him with a simple “How’s your Latin?” while gesturing vaguely to the writing.

Techno took one look at the stone before turning back to help Wilbur with Phil. “That’s not Latin.”

The youngest sighed and found a place along the wall to tie the reigns to defeatedly, Wilbur handing Phil over to Techno so he could dismount easier. The door creaked loudly as it swung open, displacing swarms of dust into the air that only spread further as they walked into them through the doorway. The interior of the house didn’t look much better, a thin layer coating all the furniture that was within sight, making everything seem fuzzy.

“Looks like we’ve got a lot of work to do,” Wilbur stated, pulling Tommy out the way by his shoulder so that Techno could move past him to the staircase. “We’re gonna go see if we can find a bedroom or something, feel free to have a look around.”

And with that—they were gone, and Tommy was left to stand alone in the unfamiliar living room.

He took tentative steps forward, lifting a hand to brush some of the years off the back of the sofa—instantly regretting that decision as his eyes burned in protest to the particles kicked up. He coughed loudly, fanning the dust in front of his face to try and clear the air as he moved into the kitchen.

The kitchen was less dusty, though it showed its age in other ways. One of the windows was smashed, a cold breeze filtering in past the cracks in the glass. There was a weird abundance of plants growing through the gaps of insulation, kinds that Tommy had never seen before. 

Just as he was about to touch the budding stem an arm reached into his vision to halt the advance. He looked up the length of his arm to be met with Techno’s loving face, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.

“Don’t touch those, something’s wrong with them.”

Tommy fixed his brother with a very blank stare. “They are plants. How the hell can there be something wrong with plants?” he exclaimed, before adding on, “That you can see by eye for that matter?!”

Techno rolled his eyes, digging through a cupboard around head height for a moment before pulling out a ceramic bowl. “That kind of plant shouldn’t be able to climb. They stay on the ground, and here one is hallway up the wall.” 

He shoved the bowl into Tommy's hands after filling it halfway with cold water and placing a folded cloth in it. “Take that to Will, second door on the right,” he ordered, stepping to the right to shift through the next cupboard in the dingy kitchen.

Tommy grumbled the whole way there at being told what to do, immediately quietening upon pushing the door open with his side. Phil was laid across the bed, with Wilbur's coat being used as a blanket instead of the ratty one already there. Wilbur was sat on the bed next to him, watching with tired eyes as he combed his hand through the blondes tangled hair.

“What was all the yelling about?”

He didn’t even look up as Tommy walked next to the bed, just reaching for the cool cloth once he set the bowl down on the bedside table. He placed the cloth on their father’s forehead, smoothing over any creases in the material—only then did he turn his attention to Tommy, as the boy had yet to give an answer.

The boy tore his eyes away from Phil's pale face when he felt Wilbur's gaze on him, shaking himself out of his stupor.

“Tech was being a know-it-all about plants, had to put him in his place,” he stated confidently, hoping his true emotions weren't leaking onto his face.

Wilbur smiled wearily, shooing him off with an idle wave of his hand. “Go bother him again then, I'm sure he’ll find something for you to do.”

With that, Tommy hurried back downstairs—happy to have an excuse to be away from that room and the man that wasn’t quite Phil. His dad was so strong, keeping them safe for a whole year after rescuing them, and the weak body laid on the creaking bed was not his dad. But that was okay; Tommy was gonna find him.

He spent the next couple of hours racing up and down the stairs, simultaneously bringing things to Wilbur and helping Techno clean up the old house. Together they had managed to excavate most of the dust, the rooms looking a lot less abandoned after just a little bit of love.

He tried his best to be quieter as the day dragged on and the evening arrived, he really did. It didn't take a genius to see just how tired both his brothers were, how the stress of the day was starting to wear them thin. 

It was hard to be quiet however, when he tripped on the last step of the stairs he was running up and went tumbling straight into the wall at the end of them. It was even harder to be quiet when the wall didn’t stop him quite like he had expected, instead giving way completely to leave him sprawled on the floor. 

He couldn’t quite focus as he heard two set of footsteps coming towards him, question shouts sounding from two different directions, because holy shit-

He'd just found a secret room!

The approaching footsteps faltered as the other two came to the same conclusion as him, with Techno reaching down to pull him off the floor. Wilbur brushed past him carefully once he was on his feet, kneeling down before an inconspicuous pile covered by a stained sheet. He dragged the sheet towards him, carefully avoiding catching it on the corners to find—

“Books?”

The other two filed into the room, dislodging more grotty sheets to find even more piles of books. The floor was almost completely covered, with it being difficult to find a place to sit down without perching yourself on a miniature novel. They sifted through them for about five minutes—too tired to really concentrate on the language the majority of them were written in, that wasn’t anywhere even remotely close to English.

The peaceful silence was broken tentatively by Techno, who called for Wilbur as he held out a book.

The book looked newer than the ones they couldn’t read, though still far older than any of them. it was bound in dark green leather and was patterned with various plants on the cover. The title was painted on in a decorative penmanship, hard to read but Wilbur could still make out the words: Herbs and Spices for Minor and Major Ailments. 

“Do you think it’ll help?” Wilbur asked, flicking through the first few pages of the book.

Techno hummed as he moved to stand up, carefully stepping around the piles of books and back towards the hallway. “Maybe, it’s worth a shot though. I found some stuff in the kitchen earlier, we can see what we can do with it.”

Tommy made a noise of annoyance as Wilbur also moved to stand up. He knew he was being childish, but he couldn’t find the willpower to do anything about it. 

“But the secret room! Just think of all the treasures we could find in here,” he whined, eyebrows furrowing as Wilbur turned to him with pity etched across his face.

“We’ll investigate tomorrow Tommy, I promise.”

With that he turned, following Techno down the stairs and leaving Tommy to wallow in his misery.

The kitchen looked a lot nicer after Tommy and Techno had had an attempt at cleaning it, the plants removed and the window boarded up shoddily. The grime had been wiped off the counters, leaving them with nothing but the old book from the study and the various jars of dried ingredients laid across them.

Wilbur and Techno pondered over what description best fit Phil's symptoms for a while, going back and forth until they collectively decided to just go for a generic illness remedy. They had most of the things for it already, only missing a couple of ingredients; it had been annotated that they could be found in the forest around them anyway (the handwriting looked an awful lot like Phil's).

Techno had almost refused when Wilbur had offered to go and retrieve them now, but the worry for his dad had won him over in the end. It didn’t mean he was happy about it—complaining almost the entire time Wilbur was preparing to leave.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to go? It’s getting dark soon, you can just stay here.”

Wilbur chuckled from where he was pulling on his second shoe, reaching for the discarded book once he got it on. “I’ll be fine, I’ll just use my wings. Look after dad while I'm gone?”

Techno nodded from where he was perched nervously by the table. “Of course, you don’t even have to ask.”

Wilbur smiled at the assurance, pulling the door open with a creak that echoed through the room and stepping out into the dusk.

The darkness was a lot more consuming once he was actually in it, so he took the moment to form his wings. The translucent shapes formed just behind his back—not quite touching it—and lit up his immediate area.

Even with the familiar light of his wings, the woods were a lot scarier alone. There were certain areas between the trees that didn’t seem to light up no matter how close he got to them, shadows bending into awkward shapes behind him. He found the first ingredient fast enough, a small brown mushroom with yellow spots, but he couldn’t for the life of him see the other one anywhere.

The forest only seemed to get creepier as he walked further into it, eyes following his every move from somewhere just out of his line of sight. He brought his wings closer into himself—both for security and to be able to see the book clutched in his cold and slowly numbing hands. He only needed one little pink flower and he could turn around; scurry his way back home with his tail between his legs and ignore the way the forest called out to him.

To his luck, he stumbled into a tiny clearing with a clump of the exact flowers he needed, swaying invitingly on the other side of the treeline. He walked over carefully, wary of the slightly suspicious circumstances he had found them with. When no immediate dangers jumped out at him, he leaned down to pick them, tucking a few into his pocket just in case.

He felt a chill run through him as he turned to leave, finding the narrow path he took into the clearing blocked by a single daffodil. It hadn’t been there when he passed that spot before—he had seen a general lack of most flowers on his trip in the forest, let alone a fully grown daffodil. The most unsettling thing about it was the fact that there was only one, with no evidence of others even beginning to sprout—something that Wilbur had never seen in his whole life.

He shrugged it off; he got what he came for and it was too late to be worrying about it.

The woods were eerily quiet on the way back, though Wilbur chalked it up to knowing he was on his way out of them. An overactive imagination was a trait that ran in the family, so Wilbur was relieved to see the lights from the cabin filtering through the gaps in the trees.

Techno seemed relieved to see him too, jumping up to open the door before Wilbur could even reach for the handle. He was ushered inside with the same level of haste, barely having the time to shake his wings away before the door was slammed shut behind him.

“Everything okay?” Wilbur asked, moving to hang up his jacket after handing over the small flora. “You're acting weirder than normal.”

Techno paused from where he was pulling a chopping board off the wall, actions resuming after Wilbur walked over and placed the book back on the table. “Yeah, I just-” he organised the ingredients on the board, pulling a knife from the block. “Somethings off about these woods Will, I don’t get it.”

Wilbur hummed as he sorted through the jars on the table next to him, letting the silence ring as the both worked on the remedy. They retreated back upstairs after it was put to a boil, following the recipe and letting it simmer overnight. They just had to hope that Phil would be fine until morning.

* * *

**W** ilbur opened his eyes to the forest again, though somet **h** ing was different about it.

He wasn’t entirel **y** sure he was even awake; the details of the trees surrounding him seemed far too blurry for this to be real. There was clearly something off about the birches, he could tell from the way the grew from the groun **d** bent at awkward angles, branches slowly growing in h **i** s direction.

He took a frightened step back, only to fin **d** himself completely cornered from all angles—the trees forming a tight circle encasing him. The leaves opened up as the **y** got closer to him, buds blooming **o** pen as the trees stretched f **u** rther and further away from their roots.

They weren't just normal trees though, the dark areas on the trunks had white slits running down the middle of them, flitting around like a nervous pupil.

The **b** irches acted almost animalistically, eyes t **r** ained on him as they dug their claws **i** nto him—branches tearing at the hem of his **n** ight shirt.

Wind whistled throu **g** h the leaves, sound not quite reaching his ears properly as every **t** hing started to muffle.

Branches continues to grow as **h** e lost the ability to move to them, thorns digging into the flesh of his bare ankles. The pain flared up his legs and the blood started to trickle down his feet but Wilbur felt almost numb, a strange calling in the middle of his ch **e** st.

The rush in his ears cleared as a voice broke through the haze. It sounded awfully familiar but he couldn’t quite place fro **m** where, a name just on the tip of his tongue.

 **H** e was shocked out of his thoughts when the voice called out again, far closer than the time before. He managed to recognise it as a shout of his name, though he wasn’t sure if it was a call he would want to answ **e** r.

The branches dug even further in as a lone outcast reached for his left shoulder, leaves growing before his eyes as the t **r** ee advanced. It halted just before it was about to touch him and Wilbur was shook viol **e** ntly from his dream.

He woke up in the same bed he fell asleep in—the dusty one in the room opposite the master bedroom—with Tommy stood over him, the boy blocking out the light from the hallway and casting a shadow over his face. He couldn’t quite see the look on Tommy's face but he could at least see his mouth open to explain himself.

**“We both know the consequences.”**

Wilbur cried out tiredly in alarm, sitting up and flipping on the light next to the bed. The blonde looked at him confused, as if he was unaware that an opening sentence like that would cause concern.

Wilbur ran a hand through his hair, dragging it out his eyes before looking up to address his brother. “What the fuck did you just say?”

Tommy's eyebrows raised in surprise before he repeated himself, albeit slower this time.

“I asked if you were getting up? Techno and I have been calling your name for like ten minutes,” he expressed, reaching a hand towards Wilbur. “Are you okay?”

Wilbur brushed his hand off, reaching for his abandoned glasses and putting them on after shaking his head to clear his thought. “I'm fine, what's for breakfast?”

Tommy brightened up at that, launching into a rant about their older brother’s cooking as he led Wilbur down the stairs. The morning continued as normal and Wilbur pointedly ignored the small rips in the bottom of his shirt.

**Author's Note:**

> the woods call out to you dear reader, are you willing to listen?
> 
> i always loved reading stories where there was some sort of mystery to be unlocked, so i tried my hand at one :) there are a few hints in the chapter about the true plot of this book, see if you can point them out in the comments
> 
> if you have questions i could try to answer them but i wont give too much away at once, happy hunting :]


End file.
